Global report on food security calls for policy change

An independent commission of scientific leaders from 13 countries, including Australia, has released today a detailed set of recommendations to policy makers on how to achieve food security in the face of climate change.

The Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change (CSACC) has released the report, titled ‘Achieving food security in the face of climate change’.

According to CSIRO, a major transformation in the food system is needed to address future threats to food security.

CSIRO’s Deputy Director of Sustainable Agriculture, Dr Peter Carberry, said Australia has an important role to play. Dr Carberry said, “For our nation, this report reinforces the critical role our science plays in the global food system, identifying priorities at the global scale across sometimes conflicting issues.

“Australian agriculture accounts for at least 25 per cent of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions – a figure similar to the global average. We need to contribute to the global challenge of reducing greenhouse gases from agriculture by 50-80 per cent by 2050 while, at the same time, contributing to a 30-80 per cent increase in global food production,” Dr Carberry said.

CSIRO said it is working with Australian farmers, industry and government to enable the continued productivity of agriculture in Australia, while reducing our environmental footprint.

How can you have food security in Australia and reduce our environmental foot print when you have mining companies on the door step of our food supply and foreign countries buying our land and sending their people here to farm without any knowledge of our land, and our farmers sell most of what they produce to foreign companies so are price takers not price makers. Those who go these meetings should be their heads out of the clouds and talk to Australian farmers on their farms and give them priority.